A run of show(also called a rundown, show flow, or ROS) is the timed, sequenced list of everything that happens in a live event: each segment, its planned start time and duration, who's responsible for it, and the cues or notes the crew needs when it's happening. It exists for two jobs, not one. Before the event, it's the planning document the team builds the show around. Once the event starts, it's the live script a show caller actually runs the event from, calling standby and go off it in real time while the schedule holds, slips, or gets cut on the fly. Most guides to a run of show only cover the first job. The second is where the document earns its keep.
Run of show vs agenda vs schedule vs rundown vs cue sheet
These five terms get used loosely, and mostly overlap, but they aren't identical. Here's how they actually differ:
| Term | What it is | How it differs from a run of show |
|---|---|---|
| Agenda | A list of topics or segments an audience or attendee sees. | Written to be read, not executed. No durations, owners, or cues, just what's happening and roughly when. |
| Schedule | A general timeline of when things start and end. | Covers timing but usually stops there, no dept ownership, no cue detail, no built-in expectation that it gets called live off. |
| Rundown | Same document as a run of show, different name. | No real difference. “Rundown” is more common in broadcast/news, “run of show” in corporate and live events. |
| Show flow | Same document again, a third common name. | Interchangeable with run of show and rundown, no meaningful distinction. |
| Cue sheet | A department-specific list of technical cues and their triggers. | Narrower and single-department (lighting, video, audio). A run of show is the full-event timeline every department works from; it should reference cues, not replace a department's own cue sheet. |
What actually goes in one
Row by row, a working run of show converges on the same handful of fields: a start time (ideally computed from durations, not hand-typed), a duration, the item or segment name, the department or person who owns it, and notes or cues the crew needs while it's live. The full column breakdown and a populated example table are in the run of show template guide, this page is about what the document is, not how to build one row by row.
Who uses one
- Show caller. Runs the live event off the run of show, calling standby and go to every department against it in real time.
- AV / technical director. Reads it for exact cue timing, what triggers on video, audio, and lighting, and how much lead time each cue needs.
- Stage manager. Uses it to track talent movement, changeovers, and whether the show is holding to plan or needs to be told to compress.
- Producer. Builds it before the event as the plan, then leans on it during the event to decide what gets cut, held, or pushed if something runs long.
A short example
A half-day conference run of show might open with doors at 9:00, a 5-minute welcome at 9:30, a 25-minute keynote at 9:35 with a hard out because the room is booked again at noon, a changeover, a panel, a buffer block built in around 10:50 to absorb whatever ran long earlier, then a demo and closing remarks. Every row has a start time, a duration, an owner (host, AV, stage), and a note (mic count, lighting level, hard out). That's the planning half. The execution half is what happens when the keynote runs 10 minutes long and everything after it is now wrong, covered next.
The live side: standby, go, hold, reflow
A run of show isn't just filled out once and printed. During the show, it's read against the clock and called from, out loud, over comms. A short vocabulary covers most of it:
- Standby.The call that a cue is coming, give the department a moment to confirm they're ready before it's triggered.
- Go (or cue). The trigger to actually execute the cue that was just put on standby.
- Hold.A call to pause or delay a cue that was about to go, usually because something upstream isn't ready yet.
- Reflow. What should happen to every downstream start time the moment one segment runs long or short: they recompute automatically instead of someone retyping the rest of the column by hand, mid-show.
The calling conventions themselves, how far ahead to call standby, what to do when the show is running behind, are covered in How to Call a Show. If you're also comparing tools to build and run one in, the run of show software guide covers what to look for. Runsheet is built around exactly this two-part definition: build the run of show, then run the show live from the same document, with reflow and synced screens handled automatically.
FAQ
- What is a run of show?
- A run of show is the minute-by-minute schedule a live event is built and executed from: every segment, its planned start time and duration, who's responsible, and what cues or notes matter when it's happening. It's used two ways: as a planning document before the event, and as the live script a show caller runs the actual event from, calling standby and go off it in real time.
- What's the difference between a run of show and a rundown?
- None, in most productions. "Rundown" and "run of show" are used interchangeably for the same document. Broadcast and news teams lean toward "rundown," corporate and live-event teams lean toward "run of show," but they describe the same thing: a timed, sequenced list of what happens and when.
- What's the difference between a run of show and an agenda?
- An agenda tells attendees what's happening and roughly when. A run of show tells the crew what's happening, exactly when, how long it should take, who owns it, and what cue triggers the next thing. An agenda is written to be read. A run of show is written to be executed.
- Who writes the run of show?
- Usually whoever owns the event on the production side: a producer, stage manager, or the show caller who'll be calling it live. On larger shows it's assembled from pieces, AV timing from the technical director, content and speaker timing from the producer, then merged into one document so there's a single source of truth the whole crew works from.
- Is a run of show the same as a cue sheet?
- Not quite. A cue sheet is narrower: a list of individual technical cues (lighting, video, audio) and their triggers, usually owned by one department. A run of show is the full timeline every department works from, and it should reference the cues, not replace the cue sheet a department needs for its own execution.
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